Advances in telecommunication systems have improved the ability of emergency personnel to respond to an emergency. For example, when a caller dials 911 or another emergency telephone number, information about the location of the caller can be automatically provided to the local authorities. 911 calls are typically processed by a Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) that processes emergency calls and dispatches an appropriate response. The PSAP evaluates an automatic number identifier (ANI) associated with an incoming call to identify the telephone number of the calling party. The ANI can then be used to retrieve information about the location of the calling party from an Automatic Location Identification (ALI) database. The ALI database may provide, for example, the address of the calling party, together with appropriate directions, or a nearest cross street. In this manner, appropriate emergency personnel can be dispatched to the indicated location, even if the calling party is unable to state his or her location.
In addition, recent advances in telecommunication systems permit important messages to be provided to an entire community during an emergency. For example, a number of techniques have been proposed or suggested to automatically inform the public of an emergency situation, or to provide a public service message. Typically, such community notification systems maintain a database containing a telephone number or electronic mail address (or both) of each member of the relevant community. Thereafter, in the event of an emergency affecting the community, a recorded message is sent to each specified telephone number or electronic mail address. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,559,867 and 5,912,947, assigned to Sigma/Micro Corp., of Indianapolis, Ind., describe a public notification system that automatically initiates telephone calls to telephone numbers identified in a database of users. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 6,463,462, assigned to Dialogic Communications Corporation of Franklin, Tenn., describes an automated system for delivering messages to a community of users. For example, if there is an accident at an industrial site in a particular community, a community notification system can automatically call all residents within a certain radius of the site and play a recorded message providing information about the emergency.
While such community notification systems can be effectively employed to notify a large number of people in the event of a catastrophic emergency or another event affecting an entire community, they cannot effectively notify a small group of people that are affected by more routine or personal emergencies. In addition, currently available community notification systems provide the same message to all community members using static contact information, and are unable to tailor the message or the distribution list to characteristics of an incoming emergency call. A need exists for a mechanism for notifying one or more interested parties when a person calls 911 or another telephone number.